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Topic: Electric bikes (Read 101786 times)

We recently got electric bikes from Sondors and I am hooked! I use it for everything including grocery shopping, and I am finding that it makes me want to ride my bike a whole lot more than drive around town. I look for excuses to go places so I can ride. We have the kind that also folds and love the long range of the battery (somewhere between 50-85 miles) depending on rider size and the terrain. They have several different models all under $1,000 so we decided to take the plunge. And the technology has come a long way. These bikes are much smoother and fun to ride than bikes I tried years ago.

I am riding much more and further than I was riding with my regular bike and because you can adjust the pedal assist I can adjust how much of a workout I want. Some days I donít even use the battery at all and use it as a regular bike. I do like the option to adjust how hard you pedal at any given moment and the idea of efficiency, affordability and health benefits have me addicted to electric biking. It feels great not being so dependent on a vehicle these days. Itís liberating in a way. MMM was right! Compared to a car the savings and benefits to health are huge. And the fun too!

I built a 1000W kit from Luna Cycle and ride it daily for my 20 mile round trip work commute. I've put about 1000 miles on it so far and love it. I only use pedal assist, mostly at level 2 which keep me around 15mph going uphill or 25mph on flat with moderate-hard pedaling. I still bust my ass pedaling the thing. Interval style mostly, hard as I can at points then slow down for a bit and repeat.

I feel much better mentally riding the bike instead of driving. It puts me in a great mood usually. My morning ride I take streets for about 4 miles and I'm fortunate to have a trail that covers 6 miles to work. It's uphill the whole way to work which takes me about 35-40 minutes and on the way back I can do it in about 25 typically. It's about 15-20 minutes by car depending on traffic so I am getting an hour of exercise that only costs me an extra 20 minutes of my day. Love it.

Hi all!I am jumping in so that I can follow more of this conversation. I read through everything and about 40% of what everyone said made sense to me.

I previously cycled a lot when I lived in North Florida (very flat) and got out of the habit/lazy when I moved to the hilly north. I bought a hybrid vehicle, which is great because I commute a lot for my side hustle (pet sitting) although I only serve a 5-mile radius (which seems ideal for cycling)... HOWEVER I have a day job that is a 23 mile round trip commute 3-4 days per week.

Long story short, my transmission blew yesterday... the car has almost 200k on it, is 18 years old... and I just don't know if it's worth fixing. Luckily it's a neat car and otherwise in amazing shape (it's a 2000 Honda Insight- 1st Gen) so I can sell it for more than scrap... but now I'm seriously considering if an E Bike would be a good fit for me. I have access to a company car for very snowy days or longer trips at a $0.22/Mile reimbursement rate... so I may be able to make this work.

I'm slowly gaining an understanding of how they work, which have good reputations, etc... but here's a very vain question... are there any that are nice looking? I hope that doesn't come off wrong... I generally believe in function over form... but I'm a fan of straight flat lines, matte, etc... I had a single speed/fixed gear flip hub when I lived in florida and is was very plain and sleek.So far I sort of like how the Sonders Thin 7 looks, although I don't know that I'm a fan of the fully blocked in center look... but just curious if there are other nice looking bikes that will perform?

Thanks ahead of time for the advice. The poor instant chats on these E Bike websites are getting SO MANY questions from me right now. Ha!

Hi I'm buying an ebike kit and combining that with a batter from amazon and an ebike frame I found on craigslist. I'm not sure what kind of lights to put on them though. Does anyone have ideas about which to use? I'm looking for super bright ones and the kind that go in the wheel spokes. These are what I've found so far. I really want as much light as possible so that I don't end as a bug on a windshield. I'm hoping to slightly mimic an emergency vehicle so people pay more attention. Not enough to get in trouble. But I'm hoping a purple and white light is similar enough to a police siren to scare someone into paying attention. What do you guys think?

Those spoke lights are cool haha. Go for it. Can't hurt. I still wouldn't expect anyone to see you, so continue to ride like they don't. Personally my goal is to ride in a way that it doesn't matter if they see me or not. Stay alert and know where the cars are at all times.

I do like to put my headlight on blink mode when I'm going through busy intersections with no traffic light, or any roads where cars are more likely to turn in front of me (either from the right or oncoming and turning left). Doing this seems to help a little. Luckily I only have a couple of those kind of spots on my commute.

I wasted a lot of time and money adding lights. They don't make a bit of difference. I ran out of bar space before I was able to get enough lights on my bike to keep Priuses and Escapes from trying to kill me by pulling out in front of me.

What did make the difference was a neon helmet cover (I went with neon green), and a horrifically clashing neon yellow riding shirt/jacket (depending on the weather). Once I added those, people saw me, and the number of Priuses trying to kill me dropped to about zero.

Hey that's about 20min from where I grew up! I just was down there for Thanksgiving as well. Next time I'm near Penn Valley I will definitely stop by.

Syonyk

That's how I will say goodbye from now on: "May the number of Priuses trying to kill you drop to zero." But that is a good idea, I think mine will be a neon orange that looks like an ironman helmet. DIY of course.

Hey that's about 20min from where I grew up! I just was down there for Thanksgiving as well. Next time I'm near Penn Valley I will definitely stop by.

Syonyk

That's how I will say goodbye from now on: "May the number of Priuses trying to kill you drop to zero." But that is a good idea, I think mine will be a neon orange that looks like an ironman helmet. DIY of course.

Nice! Happy to have you, word is spreading and people are starting to drop in.